Lock and Key
by tazdevil
Summary: To me, their are only two parties: the prey and the predator, the criminal and the victim. To be the prey is to be the bullied, the weak and the hurt. And I don't want to be a part of that. So what else is there for me to do other then lock myself away?
1. Red on White

**A/N: Hey! This is my first fanfic! I do not own PoT, but I do own Ryo and Maria! Please R&R!**

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**Prologue**

I sat in the lone sand box on the outskirts of the playground. I could hear all the jeering and thumping of feet from the other kids as they enjoyed their recess.

I picked up sand in my hand and let it slide back to the ground through my fingers. This was both soothing to my mind and my ears. I smiled down at the sand. It helped me forget about things. This little sand box was like my own little world. Just my sand and me.

"Hello, Ryo," a voice from above came, an intruder in my world. I could feel reality slip back with that single 'hello'. I scowled. "Can I play with you?"

I think you can already guess who I am. Yeah, that's right, I'm Ryo Echizen, younger twin sister of Ryoma Echizen. You can tell we're related. Our names sound alike. Oh yeah, and we look a lot alike…

You also might be thinking, "How cool! You're the daughter of the great Samurai Nanjiro! That must be great!" well, stop thinking that, because **YOU ARE WRONG**.

Unlike the other kids that have famous parents who don't have the time to spend with them, my dad spends loads of time with my brother and I, but that's not the problem. It's all of his fans and the paparazzi that want to spend time with him too.

At first they were just begging him to teach them, or for merchandise, or taking the stalker/molester approach: ripping off clothing. These approaches were not working. One, my dad loves teasing and the only time he yields is when kaa-san gets mad, and two, my dad was getting clothes made of stronger material.

Well, unfortunately (in this case), humans learn from their experiences. Since they could not get to oyaji directly they decide to take an **IN**direct route. They were going to use my brother and I. Mainly me though, since my brother was somewhat unapproachable. I, on the other hand did not give off the same aura, so the fans, paparazzi, etc. used their kids to befriend me to use me to get favors. The effect of this you ask? Well, now I have no friends and I don't trust people…easily… My life's already this bad and I'm only five years old.

When it first started I'd be getting visits from children from other school and preschools and sometimes they were older than me. They'd ask for friendship and in the beginning I always got hurt when I found out I had made another fake friend, but I learned. I wouldn't fall for that anymore.

"Umm… Ryo? Can I play?" _Play?_ With what, my emotions? I had just turned down someone yesterday. What did they do, stand in line and wait their turn to see who could fool me?

"No." I said, finally looking up. The girl had bright orange hair and piercing light blue eyes. I had never seen her before at the preschool, but she had to go here. I'd never heard of **preschoolers** cutting school.

"No? Why not?"

"You only want my father." Was 'falls for anything' printed on my head or something?

"But… I don't snow your dad…" she seemed confused and I think she meant 'know'… For a second I wanted to believe her, but I had experience. I wasn't going to get hurt again.

"I've heard that one before. You need a better excuse," I said. This was getting annoying.

"It wasn't an excuse. I guess you don't trust-"

"I don't even **KNOW **you." I had cut her off.

"OK then!" for some reason she seemed cheery now. What was wrong with her? No one was this persistent. "Then let's start over. My name's Maria! I know your name because I asked the other kids why you were alone. They said that I should ski for myself!"

"Do you mean 'see' not 'ski'?"

"Yeah! That's what I meant! Also I just moved here!" she seemed to be getting happier and happier. I was started to wonder if she would explode with happiness and spray me with her happy guts. " I really wanted to ski, er, I mean see if you would be my first fiend!"

"You mean friend." Was she American? Why so many errors? Well, I guess an excuse could be that we were five. She probably wasn't learning two languages at the same time either, like me. Even if her speech was bad she sounded like she meant what she was saying. Also five year olds are pretty bad liars. I'm a bad liar myself.

I sighed, trying to get ready for the pain that would probably come from this. "Sure." I pointed at the sand and she smiled, giving me a genuine smile. I couldn't help but smile back, giving her a genuine smile of my own. Maybe this time would be different, but I knew that I still needed to prepare for something bad.

**Months later…**

It was winter, close to Christmas, and it _had_ been different! Maria and I were best friends! Instead of her asking to come over to my house like all the others she invited me to hers. When I did invite her to my house she didn't ask for anything from my father. She was way more interested in me. She even stood up for me. When we unwillingly heard kids talking about me Maria would bust in and say things like, "NO SHE'S SNOT!" 'Snot' meaning 'not'. I also helped Maria with English and she even decided to take up Japanese too. We promised that one day we would go to Japan. What was even better was that she got along with Ryoma. Everything was going perfect.

Right now I was waiting with my mom at a street corner that I was supposed to meet Maria at. I was bouncing on the balls of my feet to keep warm. Sometimes I caught the falling snow on my tongue. Maria and I were going to make our wish lists for Santa and Maria was also looking for me a birthday present. She said that she was going to try to top the present I had given to her.

It had been an early gift that I gave her at the beginning of the month. At that time I didn't know when her birthday was. Truth has it we share the same birthday. Cool, huh?

I had given her a simple gold ring with "Maryo" inscribed on the inside. It was a mixture of our names. I had an identical one. In the end we both had made them into necklaces. We only took them off to sleep so we wouldn't choke on them.

"RYO!!!!!!!" I heard a familiar voice scream. It was no one but Maria! I waved my hand vigorously in the air, smiling a large grin that was identical to the one on her face.

She started to run, leaving her mother that I hadn't noticed before behind her, but she never got to me.

I told you that I was standing at a street corner, right? Well, Maria was coming to the street corner too… but hers was **across** the street from mine. She had run out into the street her eyes locked with mine when I heard the screech that could only come from a car. No matter how much they tried to stop it was too late.

Maria lay at the tires of the car, her blood staining the fallen snow. Red and white. It was horrible. Her eyes were still locked with mine. I wanted to run to her, but my legs wouldn't let me move. I was frozen and I new it was not due to the weather.

I could feel all the happiness that I had for the past few months seep out of my as more blood seeped out of Maria. I let loose a blood curdling scream as I felt the pain that I had started, but forgotten, to prepare myself for after all this time.

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**A/N: Thanks if you read the Prologue! Please review!**

**-taz**


	2. Coincidence

**I AM SO SORRY! To all the people who read the first chapter and waited for another chapter I'm soooooo sorry. First I don't update then I say I discontinued it. I'm a butt head... and a jerk. But I'll continue this story. I promise! So I typed this up for all of you so don't hate me! _ **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Prince of Tennis**

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**Chapter 2: Coincidence**

Let me tell you: nothing is ever truly an accident. There is no such thing as coincidence or any of that other crap that people tell you. If something happens, it happens for a reason and there's no _accident _about it. Like if you keep seeing a boy wherever you go then that means that they're most likely stalking you, not that you two just _happen _to run into each other.

After seeing the world like this, things started to make sense.

**L&K~ L&K~ L&K**

Standing outside my new classroom, I felt excited. It was not because there were kids behind that door that could be my new friends; I was long past trying to make any of those. It was because I would be able to see my brother again.

Now we had only been separated for a couple of weeks since he had moved to Japan. I had stayed back in America. There were things there that were hard to leave, but I won't get into that now.

I know. A couple of weeks are a short time, but think of it this way: what if you left your dominant arm on the other side of the world. Painful, right? Now what if that arm was your best friend? So as I waited outside I couldn't help but be excited. Especially since he didn't know I was here. That's right. I'm a surprise.

"Echizen-san, you can come in now," I looked at my new Sensei who had stuck his head out of the door.

I pushed myself off of the wall and walked into the room, turning to face the front. Sensei followed and stood right next to me.

"This is our new transfer student," He started, but I could already see kids looking back and forth between Ryoma, who was sleeping, and me, "Her name is Ryona Echizen."

I didn't like my real name. It was too much like Ryoma that it was almost stupid. It was the same thing with Ryoga. You could get tongue tied saying all our names together. That's why I preferred Ryo, short and sweet.

"You can take a seat next to your brother."

I walked down the aisle, feeling the eyes of the other kids following my every motion. Had Ryoma already made himself famous in this school? It had to be in tennis, no doubt.

I sat down in the cold, plastic chair and stared at my brother as class started up again. I couldn't help but smirk a bit. My brother. He made our meeting so anticlimactic. Here we were and he wasn't even awake.

I reached over and pinched his ear, like I would at home. He lazily opened one eye and it slid over to look at me. The reaction was priceless.

He jumped up, knocking back his chair, and pointed at me. It's nice to know that I can make my brother act like this. He seemed to realize that we were not at home and regained his composure, putting back on his normal expression. He bent down slowly, lazily, and picked up his chair and sat down once again. But his gaze never left mine.

He put his head back on his desk and lay his head on one arm. The other he put under his desk and started to make hand signs.

_Why are you here?_

I smirked at him. It was hard to tell whether he liked his surprise or not.

_Because I can be. We'll talk later._

I signed back to him. We could talk over lunch or something, but right now we had to do some that we do best. Sleep in class.

**L&K~ L&K~ L&K**

I think the teacher was use to an Echizen sleeping class because he never bothered us. This really made me wonder what my brother had been doing here. My curiosity grew even more when we passed by a girl who called him 'Ryoma-sama' on our little trek to the roof.

"So what are you doing here?" Did I ever tell you I love my brother? I mean the one who doesn't even say hi to me.

"Love you too, _Ryoma-sama_. You knew I was coming. You just didn't know when. So… Surprise!" I threw my arms in the air. Ryoma got the point and gave me a hug. "I've missed you."

"Hn." Ryoma might be a man – I mean a boy- of few words, but you just had to listen when he talked because he actually said a lot. Well, not really said, but it was in his voice. And right now I could hear that he missed me too.

I brought him back to arms length.

"I still think I'm the better looking twin," I grinned.

"In your dreams," he smirked right back. And so our reunion commenced with teasing and our mother's bentos.

**L&K~ L&K~ L&K**

There wasn't any need to catch up with each other. Like I said: he was like my arm. Once it's reattached everything was good. I feel like this arm analogy underestimates our relationship…

Ryoma knew me better than my arm ever could. He brought me to the one place where we would ever have to catch up at. The tennis courts. We might have new moves to show off to each other. This was going to be good. School had just let out and we were the first to get to the courts.

I stood on the opposite side of the net, wearing a set of my brother's tennis clothes, having left my own at home, and holding one of his racquets.

"Mada mada dane. Forgetting your clothes and racquet."

"Whoever said I forgot?" I served at him, using a Twist Serve right off the bat.

He let the ball pass him by. He didn't swing or anything. Like I said, there are no accidents. He was probably testing my speed, not that I used my full potential.

"Mada mada dane." It was my turn to smirk and between us it was contagious.

The rally went on with neither of us giving up a point.

"Your accuracy is still annoying," he said, running to catch the ball that I had placed on the very corner made by the singles and base line.

"Your counters are still annoying," I said. By now we were drawing a crowd.

"OMYGOD! There's two ochibis!" I heard one particular scream.

I caught the ball that Ryoma had sent at me, ending our long rally. People started to come onto to the court while my brother jumped the net to stand next to me.

"Echizen, when did you clone yourself?" A tall boy with purple eyes looked to my brother. Probably because he was use to the one wearing a cap.

"Mada mada dane, Momo-senpai," I told you I loved my brother, right?

"What's that supposed to mean?" He brought Ryoma into a headlock and gave him a noogie. "So. Other Echizen, who are you?"

I cocked an eyebrow. He thinks I'm a boy, doesn't he? I opened my mouth to tell him off when I was attacked. It took me awhile to figure out it was a hug.

"We have another ochibi!" It was the same voice from before. After crushing my bones to a pulp he pulled back and I was shocked. Pure shock.

I could've sworn I was looking at Maria! Well, if Maria were a boy….

Like I said, there are no accidents or coincidences.

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**A/N: So there you go. They're in the normal story line so Ryona- I mean Ryo- is 12. Yeah I know. Ryona might seem a little lame but it sounded girly and you know the whole thing with RyoMa and RyoGa, so I had to have a Ryo?a something. I hoped you like this chapter because I promise to update more, so you're stuck with me! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA! So please review and tell me if you like it, if there are any errors in my writing, or if there's just something you don't like. But please don't go overboard with flames... SO THANKS! XD**

**~taz**


	3. The Clone

**Hey, it's me! I know you guys were probably spazzing from missing me so much. And maybe not... But here's another chapter! Yeah sorry for no updates on any of my stories. I just started high school. GO FRESHMAN! But I have all the new chapters nearly finish and I hope to get them up no later than Sunday. Hmm... I have nothin' else to really say SO READ ON!**

**~taz8D**

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**Chapter 3: The Clone**

"Maria?..."

"Eiji! Don't do that. He doesn't know you!" Another boy peeled this 'Eiji' off of me. There went my dream of Maria.

"Mada mada dane," I said. I am NOT a boy. I put a hand on my hip to emphasize my thoughts. They didn't get it. Maybe if I wore a tighter shirt….

"Saa, this one looks different," a honey haired boy said. His eyes were closed, or maybe squinted, so I had no idea where he was looking.

"But look at them Fujiko!" Eiji said and for the first time I think everyone really studied us.

"You're right," The boy that was restraining Eiji was looking at my pink stud earrings, like that was our only difference.

"Umm… Are you a…girl?" It was a boy with brown hair styled into a buzz cut who finally caught on. He was pretty shy for such a toned guy.

"Good boy. You deserve a treat." I know. I sounded like a jerk, but I said I was past making friends.

Ok. So Ryoma and I really did look similar. Like both of my male siblings I had the feline-like, golden eyes and the blackish-green hair and I was the same height as my twin for the time being. But I did not look male! I had the beginning of curves and I was not flat, but neither was I well endowed. The only reason they could ever think I was a boy was because of my hair, which was almost as short as my brothers. The longest strand only went down to the bottom of my neck, not even dreaming of touching my thin shoulders. My bangs covered my whole forehead and were swept to my left. covering that eyebrow and barely revealing the other. But I held them back at the moment, for tennis purposes, with a pink clip that matched my new horrendous school uniform. Pink and green. Really? But my hair framed my hair more than either Ryoma's or Ryoga's ever would. Just give us a year or two and we would look completely different.

"Ah! It is a girl!" Eiji must be taking lessons from Captain Obvious. He took my face into both of his hands and turned it from side to side. "Ochibi, why would you make your clone a girl? She can't play on the team!"

"Eiji!" Once again this boy was pulled away from me. I couldn't bring myself to glare at him though. He reminded me too much of Maria, both in mannerism and the look in his eyes. Heck, if his hair and eyes were a couple shades lighter then I could never be persuaded to think that they _weren't _related. "I'm sorry." The boy bowed to me. Something tells me he does this a lot because of Eiji.

If Maria were alive would I have to apologize like this all the time too?

I don't want to think about it. I turned away from Eiji.

"Obviously Echizen did not clone himself. That is highly improbable, seeing as cloning has not yet been perfected. There is an 87% chance that this is Echizen's sister, though. There is also an 81% chance that they are twins." A very, very tall boy with rectangular rimmed glasses said this while looking at both of us. He pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose as the lenses gleamed from the sun. While he had said all this, he had taken out a notebook and began to write in it, rather quickly in fact.

"Inui! Don't be a creeper!" I heard Eiji call from behind me.

But people still looked at us for the truth. Ryoma gave a "che". That meant yes and I was somewhat surprised to see that these people understood that it was not just a scoff.

"Nani? What? Do you have a brother too?" The boy named Momo laughed. Well, I wasn't going to be the one to tell him.

I smell introductions.

"Hey! I'm Momoshiro Takeshi, but call me Momo," He said this like I hadn't heard Ryoma call him 'Momo-senpai' before.

The others came after. The boy who was the first to question my gender was Kawamura Takashi. 'Saa' boy was Fuji Syuusuke and the silent boy next to him was the captain, Tezuka Kunimistu. The 'creeper' was Inui Sadaharu and the boy with bandana next to him was Kaido Kaoru. The boy who apologized was Oishi Shuichiro. I would probably forget all these names in a couple of hours. They were a lot, but one would stick with me.

Kikumaru Eiji.

They couldn't be related. This boy was clearly Japanese, but… but they were so similar. The look in his eyes, his bouncy nature, but that smile did it. That playful smile that I would never forget.

Again I turned away from him. The reminder was too painful.

The captain- Tanuki wasn't it?- started practice, but I still got stares every once in awhile. Finally some freshmen who were adamant in their staring came up to me.

"You're Echizen's sister?" The boy was dressed in some pretty flamboyant colors. "Well I'm Horio Satoshi and I have two years of tennis experience! So if you ever need help or anything- you know with your swing and stuff- you can come to me. I'll probably make the regulars very soon seeing as I do have _two years of tennis experience_. Echizen has a tough time with me and…" BS. No way could this uni-browed, flamboyant monkey boy even be close to Ryoma's skill. I would break his face if he dared to insult my brother like that again.

"How about _I_ _teach_ _you _a little something." I narrowed my eyes at him. I was not going to give him a sweet, sinister smile. That might give away how much embarrassment he was about go through.

"I don't know if you can Echizen-chan. I mean I am a _boy_ with two years of tennis experience…" Again, I stopped listening to this stupid kid. Not only was he moronic but also sexist? It was a good thing he wasn't in my class… Was he?...

I just turned and started walking to an empty court, picking up Ryoma's practice racquet on the way. The boys were doing laps around the courts so they wouldn't miss one if I used it. That kid followed after me, still bragging away about his tennis experience. Not really paying attention, I finally looked at the two who followed behind him. One had a bowl cut and the other reminded me of the boy who had restrained Eiji.

Eiji. He looked a little bit tired while running those laps. More tired than the others who had introduced themselves to me. Was his stamina short-lived… like Maria's life?

I needed to stop doing that. He wasn't in anyway connected to her, but I couldn't help but to finger the necklace that I had never taken off after all these years.

"Are you ready to receive lessons from the great Horio?" Mono-brow asked. I decided to call him that because 'mono' was closer to the word 'monkey' than 'uni' was. I would have to tell Ryoma later.

"You should be the one getting ready," I whispered this more to myself. It was kids like these that made my job easy. There was no pull for me to want to be their friend. "Let's have a light rally."

I knew full well that a light rally for me was definitely not a light rally for him. I gave him one of my normal serves. Normal being not a Twist Serve and this boy still couldn't return it. And he said Ryoma had a problem with him? Karupin could beat this kid. He watched my family and me play tennis enough times.

"Heh. I didn't warm up yet." Wasn't the only thing first years do was warm up?

"Whatever." I sent another serve his way. Oh. I mean I sent another ace his way.

"Whoa," Bowl cut was pointing at the spot where my ball had bounced: the very corner of the service box, "Su-sugoi!"

By now some of the boys were stopping their laps to watch our little 'rally'. If you could call it that.

"I wasn't ready that time," he said. Man, this kid was _made_ out of BS. Or maybe he ate it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner because that's the only thing that came out of him. "Now I'm ready."

He better be. I served another time and he tried reacting, but it was out of his reach, just like I thought it would be.

"40-love," I said, my voice egging him on to give another excuse. I could see him gulp.

"Ah. Haha… And that's a way not to return a ball, but I can show you how to with this next serve."

I decide to place my next serve right in front of him. If he missed this I might just roll on the floor laughing. Darn. He actually hit the ball and I think he was even a little surprised himself.

"That's how you return a ball Echizen-chan. Of course I would know with my two years of tennis experience."

I just returned the ball to the other side of the court, making him run so he could _earn_ his third year of tennis experience.

"I see you learn quickly!" He said this proudly, as if he were the one who taught me. Hey. Was he trying to hit on me from the start? Wasn't there some kind of boy code saying you don't hit on a guy's sister? "I knew I could help you."

He returned the ball for me to only send it to the opposite corner, making him run again. I could hear the beginnings of panting. This was sad. He returned the ball again, and this time I sent it straight to the corner, making him trip over his own feet trying to get to it.

I know it was mean, but I had no idea he had such horrible balance. I thought that all the hot air in his head would at least keep him afloat. I could hear some chuckles from the fence. I turned to see some of the boys laughing. Bowl cut and mini Oishi ran in to help up Mono-brow and I could hear words of reprimand like, "What made you think she couldn't play tennis?" or "Have those two years killed your brain?"

I hopped the net that separated us and walked casually up to the group.

"Sorry. I didn't think he would fall," I was really too soft for my own good. This is how I got hurt.

"It's no problem. He always getting into trouble," Bowl cut answered. "By the way I'm Katou Kachiro."

"And I'm Mizuno Katsuo." I guess I have to stop calling him mini Oishi.

I turned and walked off the court, stopping at the fence where my brother stood.

"You done yet?"

"Yada," He replied.

"Then I'll wait for you." I headed towards a bench outside of the fence.

**L&K~ L&K~ L&K**

After practice was over and everyone had changed back into there school uniforms, we seemed to play a game of twenty questions.

"Where were you the first few weeks?"

"What's your name?"

"Are you as good as your brother?"

"Are you sure you're not a clone?"

Really, I didn't feel obliged to answer any of their questions. Why do they need to know about my personal life? We weren't close or anything of the like.

"She's Echizen Ryona! She's transferred into my class today." Horio. Wasn't that kid supposed to be dying of a nosebleed somewhere?

"Ah! Ryona-chan! That's so cute!" Eiji jumped on me once again. My eyes saw nothing but the white of his jersey, as he crushed me into his chest. His actions! He reminded me so much of her. At least he didn't smell like her.

How could I describe it? He smelled like sweat… and mint. Mint? It smelled more like a tooth paste kind of mint. Now that's just weird.

I'm weird. Here I am sniffing a boy, who is squeezing me to death. A boy that reminded me so much of my best friend.

I could feel the ring on my necklace grind into my skin and a wetness come to my eyes.

Dammit. Why did I have to be the emotional twin. If I were like Ryoma, things would be much easier.

"Eiji! You're hurting Echizen-san!" Oishi pulled Eiji off of me once again. "Sorry, he does this to everyone. Even your brother."

I looked to Ryoma. He gave an almost imperceptible nod. Ryoma let this boy hug him like this? Did he fight back? Did he squirm. Was he reminded of Maria, or was it just me?

**L&K~ L&K~ L&K**

"WELCOME HOME, RYONA!" In front of my new home, stood the rest of my family. Oyaji had a big, goofy grin and Kaa-san looked happier than I'd seen her in awhile and Nanako-nee… Wait. Nanako?

"Nanako-nee!" I ran and hugged her. "I haven't seen you in forever!"

She only laughed and hugged me back. We pulled away and that gave me a chance to really look at my family.

Looking around, I felt secure. All of the smiles and the thought that all these people loved me and wouldn't dream of hurting me were so ensuring. It was nice to be sure of a mutual feeling of trust and love. And, really, I think only a family could ever make you feel like that, not friends. Because blood is thicker than water.

**L&K~ L&K~ L&K**

I let the warm water slide down the length of my body, cleansing me.

There was a knock at the door.

"Who is it?" There was no answer. That meant it was Ryoma. "Come in."

I heard the click of the door, as he opened and closed it. There was a light thunk as he sat down on the lid of the toilet.

I knew that if I asked why he was here he would just say something like Oyaji was being annoying. So instead I decided to joke around.

"I know we use to bathe together and everything, but that was when we were little! This is just ridiculous!" I said this, while standing behind the curtain. We may have shared the same womb for nine months, but we still had our modesty.

"Che."

I laughed. I only did with my family.

"Hey, I figured something out about that Horio-kid today." There was a silence, but I knew he was listening, "Did you know that he has no butt hole?"

"You know this how?" I peeked from behind the curtain. He had an eyebrow cocked.

"Because all the crap comes out of his mouth." He smirked at this. Obviously, he thought the same. I let the curtain fall as I continued my shower, every now and then starting a light conversation with my brother.

"He's not that bad."

I paused in my lathering, confused. "What?"

"Horio. He's not that bad." I looked out from behind the curtain again to see if he was messing with me. He sat on the lid of the toilet, lying back with his arms behind his head and his eyes closed. The cover boy for nonchalance. When he was like this I knew he was dead serious, but Ryoma wasn't a people person. We were alike in that aspect except that he made acquaintances, but he never talked enough to make friends.

"And why do you say that?"

He shrugged and opened one piercing, golden eye to stare at me, "Just thought you should know."

Well, it seems that there are a lot of things that I should know, like why he even felt I should know or what happened to change my older brother.

I let the curtain drop, making a barrier between me and him while I sorted out my thoughts.

Was my brother…changing? Was he becoming more sociable, when outside of our family he's only been a loner, a wolf without a pack? What could possibly bring about this change, even though it was so small? Could it be Seigaku, Japan,… a girl? I could feel a siren go off in the back of my head

"_Sorry, he does this to everyone. Even your brother."_

Eiji? Or could it be the team as a whole? I rinsed the conditioner out of my hair, hoping to wash away the chemicals and confusion.

My brother wasn't a people person. He was so quiet that he could make a mime burn bright with envy underneath all of that creepy make-up. And now he's telling me that someone like Horio was 'not that bad'?

If Japan could change my brother, then what in the world could it do to me?

**End of chapter! Isn't Ryona just a bucket of sunshine? No? Well, I guess you have a point... But you know what does have a point? A review (lol I feel like Ray William Johnson)! Please review and I'll be able to get out chapters faster from inspiration and motivation! (Yeah, I'm a lazy bum -_-) Tell me what you thought, what you liked, what you hated, what makes you hungry, where you live, your number... JK cuz that would be uber creepy. But really! Drop a review, like Santa drops a present. I don't know. Just review to get me to shut up.**

**~taz8D**


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